Language and Globalization: A Critical Study on Language, Culture, and Power Dynamics

Abstract

Since language is a mode of communication that enables individuals from many nations and cultures to understand one another, it plays a crucial part in globalization. Language variety has been significantly impacted by globalization, which has allowed the growth of international languages and their domination in the political, social, and economic realms. But regrettably, this has resulted in the decline and probable extinction of many endangered languages, especially those that are spoken by tiny, outlying populations. Several nations and international organizations have adopted English as their official language. It is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world, with an estimated 1.5 billion speakers. It frequently serves as the common language in international trade and diplomacy, which results in a decrease in the usage of other tongues. It predominately appears in media outlets and on social media platforms, which harms the usage of other languages. Because language may be a weapon for both expressing and resisting power dynamics, language and power become connected once again. By offering speakers of such languages an edge in the political, economic, and social realms, the development of global languages, especially those of dominating nations, has the potential to maintain current power relations. On the other hand, by giving speakers of different languages access to new opportunities and resources, the development of global languages can potentially undermine current power relations. The growth of international languages can, however, also have unfavorable effects on speakers of minority languages, such as language loss and cultural assimilation. Thus, globalization may eventually result in the loss of distinctive cultural knowledge and practices as well as the loss of linguistic variety. This article focuses on how language dissemination affects power relations and how urgent it is to take action to protect linguistic variety and promote multilingualism.